She's a paci girl for sure

*I apologize that the last photo is blurry, but you'll get the idea.*

The other day Riley and I were playing in the living room and by playing I mean she was getting into everything she could get her little hands on. She was in the middle of emptying her diaper basket and swinging a diaper in the air when she discovered her old stash of outgrown pacis. She squealed with delight and being the paci loving baby that she is did the following:
MORE PACIS! Who knew Mom was hiding these here, it's like Christmas come early.

I've decided that if one paci is so good, that I could probably double my fun...

YES! The baby equivalent of double fisting, I'm a happy girl! Now, I wonder if I could fit 3????

STATS

Weight: 21 lbs 14 oz. - 90-95%
Length: 29.25 inches - 95%
Head: 45.75 cms - 90 - 95%

Riley had her 9 month check up today and she continues to be at the top of the growth charts. The doctor said she's perfectly proportional and took the time to show me that her dots are following the curve - just the tippy top of the growth curve lines! She has been there since she was born so no reason to think she wouldn't continue! The doctor was so pleased and actually a little surprised at her progress as he went through her check up and questioned me about her milestone achievement. She babbled to him the whole time and smiled just as cute could be.

We did get a small bit of not perfect news when they did her hemoglobin screening and discovered that she is slightly anemic. We've started her on an iron supplement and that should help take care of that. We'll know for sure when we return for her 2nd round of flu vaccine in a month.

Also, I know many parents are vehemently against medicating their children, but Matt and I said a small hallelujah today. We have watched our poor princess suffer from a horribly congested nose for about a month now - a little nose that is scratched up from her rubbing it all day. The doctor agreed that 1 month is enough and prescribed her some infant Allegra and praise the Lord tonight for the first time I heard her inhale without that snotty rattling. IN fact, as she was going to bed she kept breathing in deep as if she was surprised that she could breathe again. It was too sweet.

Please say prayers for us that her anemia will clear up and in the meantime big 95th percentile hugs and kisses from us to all of you!

Terrible Towel Initiation

Gampy recently sent Riley a special package...her very first STEELERS TERRIBLE TOWEL bib. She wore it with pride on Sunday, even though our beloved Steelers lost to the Giants, BOO. Yo, Pats fans in the family, where are you? I've already got her well on her way to be trained to be a true Iron City girl. :) We've just about got the Terrible Towel spin down....

OMG DID SHE JUST...

TAKE SOME STEPS? Okay so this afternoon Riley and I were at home and she grabbed the little V-Tech Learning Walker she's had from Gigi and Papa for months - for those of you that have no idea what a learning walker is I linked it so you can see it. Then she stood up on her knees behind it and pushed it using her knees to take little steps forward then she stood up to her feet. I held my breath thinking surely she can't walk and push it - she's only 9 months old she can't control that thing without falling face forward by pushing too hard or straight back from not pushing hard enough....

But I was WRONG! She actually took 5 steps with it and pushed herself straight across the living room. I let out a squeal which startled her half to death and then of course she fell down to her bottom. Hopefully I didn't scare her so much she won't try again!

I can't believe it, our girl is walking...well sort of.

Oh definitely NOT ME

I did NOT spend $10 on a baby ornament that I just had to have even though it's still October because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to find it in December. Nope, NOT me that would be a little overly eager wouldn't it?

I so did NOT have to take my little princess back to the doctor twice in one week because amoxicillin just wouldn't clear up her ear infection and she needed the good stuff. NOT me because that would mean my baby might be prone to ear infections and will have several of them over the coming days, months and years. :x

We did NOT have our baby out at Glory Days at 9:30 pm on Friday for dinner and we did NOT get disapproving looks from everyone around us. Definitely NOT us, our baby is always asleep in her crib at a decent hour and doesn't make a peep all night.

I most certainly do NOT let my baby play in the refrigerator sometimes when we're in the kitchen and I definitely do NOT actually encourage her to keep doing it by taking a picture of her in there.

I am so NOT already excited about my baby's first birthday because she's having a traditional Hawaiian luau with all of our family and friends. NOT me because I can't imagine her being 1, I want my princess to stay my sweet little baby forever.

We did NOT spend $25 on a battery operated nasal aspirator in hopes that it would actually suck the snot out of our poor baby's stuffy nose. NOT us because we know better than to be fooled by baby ploys by now, don't we???? (Also, our baby is NOT using this as a $25 pacifier now)

Lastly, I did NOT write this post on Sunday and then save it for publishing on Monday so that I could avoid having to write a Not Me Muesday post again. NOT me, that would be so ridiculous and there were probably a million other things that needed to be done on Sunday besides writing a blog post for Monday...like kissing on this sweet baby.

Our First Sick Day

Last Monday, Riley and I had our first "sick day". Mommy called out of work and took the little princess to the doctor in the morning and after we got our ear infection diagnosis and some meds we returned home for some much needed R&R! First thing on the agenda was a long nap in Mommy and Daddy's bed. It was pretty interesting that even after her 2 hour nap she was happy to just lay there with me for another hour and watch Sportscenter (she's a Daddy's girl) and Playhouse Disney.

We got up for some lunch eventually and she commenced with her usual playtime activity. Here's some pics I snapped of my mini-me, and yes we both spent all day in our jammies.

Playing with her favorite toy! She crawls back and forth through the door, mashes all the buttons repeatedly and tries to scale this thing at least 10 times a day.

Watching Go, Diego Go! Her left slipper always comes off, I'm starting to wonder if her left foot is bigger than the right...

What will the address of my house be today??? Notice the puffs bottle abandoned in the corner, she just loves eating those puff.

When you're sick you need lots of fluids!

Sweet baby smiles even when she's not feeling well! Don't you just want to hug her????

Her laugh will melt your heart

This video is almost two months old, but it's too cute not to post. Please don't be concerned by the puppies "growling". They are just playing with her and they truly love her to death and protect her as if she were their own. Enjoy her sweet baby giggles, I know we do!!!! **Sorry it's a vertical film shown horizontally but you'll still get the idea, just turn your head a bit. :) **

I'm Supposed To Do What?

While we were visiting Gigi and Papa over Columbus Day weekend we realized that Riley is finally big enough for the potty that Frances sent her when she was just an itty bitty baby. It's been sitting in their powder room for months now and I couldn't help but drag her in there to have a potty talk of course with camera in tow. I sat her down and started to explain what the potty is for and this is what happened.

Hey! This is a pretty fun seat, I didn't know I had this! It's just my size and I can see my toes, at least I think those are my toes, let me wiggle them to make sure....

Are you kidding, you want me to do my private business here right out in the open for all the world to see? I know I fuss when I'm getting changed these days, but I'll stop.

I'm going to have to learn to clean after myself when I go to the bathroom and you and Daddy won't do it anymore??Oh I feel faint, I need to brace myself.

Oh Mom, seriously you are so funny. You had me going there for a second, but you're just joking aren't you Mom, right it's a joke? Hahaha.



















What, not a joke? Okay, someone get me out of here, she's scaring me.

The ninth month was a doozy

I missed the 9 month post yesterday and I was feeling slightly upset that I didn't post on the actual day until I re-read my Not Me Muesday post and I realized that I've been off by a day for the whole week. It's just been one of those weeks, and by weeks I mean month.

Let me just start off by telling you that despite the hardships of this month I would relive it over and over again in a heartbeat just for those 9th month moments again with our little girl. But, that said, it was a DOOZY and a half, I definitely as a friend of mine would say, had to put on my big girl underwears and deal with it!

Riley is 9 months I can hardly get over it. Can I make a confession? More than once this month I found myself tearing up. When I rocked her to sleep one night I realized that her sweet newborn baby smell was gone and I nearly lost it. Ridiculous isn't it? I feel conflicted. I am so thankful for her growth and all the things she's learning and every new milestone, but at the same time sometimes I wish time would slow down just a bit. I suppose every parent has had this same thought at one point or another.

I've made peace with it by deciding to make the most of every moment that we have, even those middle of the night moments that we've been having more of lately. I know that one day she won't wake up and need me to cuddle her at 2:30 am, and I'll be laying awake in my bed wishing I could wake her up for a snuggle.

What has she been up to this month? Brace yourselves, she's moving down the milestone list like a freight train! In her ninth month our princess...

Had her top two teeth break through finally and she had her first cold, ear infection and antibiotic x2 experience. The teeth and ear infection happened simultaneously god help us in the last week or so. She seems to be on the rebound though and now we just have to kick this runny/stuffy nose that we've had for the past month.

Started crawling and now she even has a turbo speed that makes us laugh like crazy. Almost immediately after the crawling came the pulling up and stair climbing. She pulls up on everything, including Mommy and Daddy's legs and she find its hilarious to have a view that's of more than the floor. She can climb the stairs like a rocket and although she's out of breath by the time she reaches the top she's determined to make it all 3 flights everytime.

Started babbling a LOT more, almost incessantly, and has conversations with everyone/thing around her. She does baba, gaga, yaya, dada, mama, and a bunch of mixed strings of sounds. She doesn't use mama and dada discriminately everytime, but first thing in the mornings when she sees Matt she almost always shrieks "DA!" and at night when she's upset its always "MamaMamaMama" coming over the monitor loud and clear.

She can turn light switches on and off and always reaches out her little hand to grab them. She's also learned that doors (and cabinets and refrigerators) can be pushed open and closed and she has great fun playing peek a boo with us by swinging them back and forth.

She just started CLAPPING her little hands together and we find it hilarious. She loves the attention it gets and she does it a lot. It's so funny to watch her little face when she gets it just right and she makes the tiniest little clapping sound.

She still waves bye, not all the time and mostly delayed, but when she does the lucky recipient is always thrilled.

She has just started wiggling her little body when she hears music. Again, we find this quite funny. Last night she was really rocking out to a Latin band at our school's International Night. She had everyone around us in stitches.

She's eating more solid foods and Miss Independent LOVES to feed herself. She's almost mastered her pincer grasp by using her index finger and thumb to grab her little food pieces. She still loves almost everything, and even eats peas now that they aren't mashed and watery.

Simply put, she's thriving and we thank God daily for that because we are well aware that these amazing moments and milestones are not a given. While we're a little sad to see another month go, we know that we have so much more to look forward to and we want to tell our girl...

Daddy and I never imagined how much more love you would bring to our lives. We are so proud of you and the little girl that you are so quickly becoming. We love you princess girl. Happy 9 months Riley!

Not Me Muesday

Not Me Monday is a Monday posting idea created by a blogger named MckMama and it's a blog craze! I have great fun reading them and I decided that I would probably have great fun posting them too. Okay, so I realize (now) today is Tuesday and not Monday, but see #1 below and welcome to Mine and Riley's very first Not Me Monday!

1. I definitely did NOT get confused and think today was Monday when I wrote this post and NOT Tuesday because that would mean 1. I'm losing my mind 2. I'm old or 3. A combination of both.

2. I so did NOT throw two, 2 year old worthy temper tantrums this weekend because I was sleep deprived. NOT me, that would be very immature and I'm old enough to know better.

3. We are NOT suffering an infant double whammy with an ear infection and teething. I also very much so did NOT silently tell myself that if the Doctor gave me that "oh you poor first time mother who rushes her kid to the doctor for everything" look one more time that I was going to ream her out and throw my third temper tantrum.

4. Our little princess is NOT growing like a weed whacked out on Miracle Gro and definitely is NOT 22 lbs and 10 oz. as of yesterday. She's still my tiny 8.8 lb newborn who lets me hold her all day

5. I am NOT going to give in and buy my baby girl this adorable Halloween costume, because it would be fiscally irresponsible to spend $20 on a one time wear costume, right? RIGHT?

6. I do NOT swipe whatever finger foods my little girl didn't finish onto to the floor for my 2 dogs to eat because I don't want to have to scoop it all up and walk it to the trash can myself. NOT me, that would be so lazy.

7. I so did NOT refer to Jacoby Ellsbury of the Red Sox as "my boyfriend" in front of my husband the other night! That would be silly because my husband is wonderful and I adore him.

Walking and Talking

Don't get excited, the princess isn't exactly doing either on her own just yet, but in a way she has been since she was born. This afternoon we met with our dearest friends Linds and Z for a walk around the Pavilion. The weather is cooling off again and the trees are hitting peak colors so we really enjoyed it. It is surreal for both of us to be pushing our almost 9 month old babies in their strollers around this little "lake" when we can still clearly remember pushing our 3 week olds around it in the middle of February . But obviously so much has changed! The strollers are getting a little heavier each week. We still come prepared with baby slings and bjorns in tow, but a few Cheerios for the ride seem to do the trick now. We're moving a little faster, (yay us!) now that we're not fresh off of c-sections. We know that there aren't really sharks in the lake, although we're still convinced that grass carp look like sharks. The conversation has evolved from excitement over first smiles to excitement and anxiety over their increasingly mobile states. Only the noise level is the same, but now instead of crying the babies carry on their own conversation with lots of babbling and shrieking.

Today Riley and Z were both pretty happy, so Linds snapped away while the adorable duo posed perfectly. While I watched her and helped maked the kiddies smile, it hit me just how much I have enjoyed our weekly walks. As we put the miles and months behind us we have reassured and comforted, pondered and decided, laughed and worried. As a new mother there is so much that is unknown and it has been a blessing to have Linds as my sounding board. Our walks will always be one of my favorite memories from this first year in our little babies lives. Love you Linds and Z!

Attention all Lifetime patrons...

In July, we joined the new Lifetime Fitness that was in the process of being built. We've been anxiously waiting and it finally opened up this weekend. The place is HUGE!!! Indoor swimming, rock climbing, basketball, volleyball, a spa, a cafe, and more cardio machines and weights than you can possibly imagine. It also has a child care center that is part of our membership where our little princess can play while we work out.

As you can see we had this all planned out and we just assumed that Riley would love playing with all the little kiddies in the child care area. With high hopes we made a reservation for her and packed up the car after her nap and headed over to test it out. We checked her in and dropped her off and all seemed well. She was happily banging on a little piano when we left her. I headed upstairs to the elliptical and Matt went to play basketball. I'm just finishing up on the machine and heading over to the weights when I hear a beep on the all call, followed by....

"Attention all Lifetime patrons, will Riley's Daddy please report to the child care center." Of course, Riley's Mommy also takes off at breakneck speed and nearly twists her ankle running back down to the center herself. Secretly we both feared this might happen and sure enough the poor princess was a complete wreck. She was sobbing, and by sobbing I mean her eyes were bright red, her nose was running, and she was hyperventilating. She was MISERABLE and it took us an hour to get her completely calmed down.

We tried again today with a plan for me to run on the treadmill for 20 minutes and then rescue her and take her swimming with me. I thought she might do a little better and decided that smaller increments of time to start off might help. Sadly, today was about as bad as yesterday and Daddy showed up and rescued her after 15 minutes. Upside is that she seemed to enjoy our time in the pool and I'm planning on making that a weekly activity.

I'm really struggling and I have such mixed feelings on this whole thing. It is very important to me that I get into a work out routine again. I used to be quite the athlete. Although those of you who have met me post swimming years might not believe it, I was a 3x a day work out machine. It is something that I really want to do for myself and her too. However, this whole child care thing is causing me great anxiety and I can't really enjoy the work out because I'm worrying about her the whole time. I know she's not dying down there, but I don't want her to be that upset either. We're taking a break tomorrow to enjoy our weekly playdate and we'll try again on Thursday. If you're thinking of it on that day say a prayer that we'll both enjoy the trip this time!

Swing, Swing Wild As Can Be

A few weeks ago we got Riley a baby swing to put up in our backyard and this past weekend after second Home Depot run, Matt was able to hang it up for her. She loves it and it's Daddy and Riley's nightly ritual to go down and swing for a while. The whole neighborhood can hear her shriek and giggle with delight. Here's some pics of the swinging queen.

More pumpkin pics!

Riley and two asses, that's what Matt said. We actually felt kind of sad for the poor animals they all looked miserable. And I'm so BUMMED we didn't get a picture of the hugely gross piggy!
Having a picnic on the lawn and listening to the live band. Matt and I had our first apple dumpling experience here and we both agreed it was DELICIOUS. Riley is upset she didn't get any of it, but we promised her she could have one next year.
Playing with Momma's wallet.
As we were leaving, Daddy carried out our Little Pumpkin.
And the other pumpkin got a stroller ride. :)

Pumpkin Patch Fun

One of my FAVORITE memories from growing up was our annual trip to the pumpkin patch and apple orchard. It was so convenient the places were right across the street from each other so we'd pick the first fall weekend day (when there wasn't a swim meet) and pick apples first and then head over and pick out pumpkins. I loved it so much, I wanted to pass that tradition down to my little girl.

So, this past weekend we took our Little Pumpkin to a local farm to pick her very first pumpkin. The weather was beautiful and although it was a little buggy, we had a great time! There was so much to see and do, we didn't get to even half of it before we had to haul out of there for nap time. We didn't make it on the hayride out to the actual pumpkin field to pick our own pumpkin, but we found a just right one in the bins up by the country store. She squealed with delight when she saw it so we knew it was for her. We are so looking forward to making this one of our own family traditions. Enjoy the pics!


At home after her nap. I just loved her little smile in this pic. Isn't she a cutie pie? I LOVE her baby cheeks.
Standing and giving me her mischievious look.
She's gone from creeping, to sort of crawling to very QUICKLY crawling to cruising all within about two weeks.
Standing up at our ottoman and taking a peek back at me.
She found a just right pumpkin! You can't see the smile because of her paci but she was grinning!
Waiting in line to pay at the country store. She wanted to hold her own pumpkin.
Can you pick our our Little Pumpkin amongst all the others?
A teeny pumpkin!
I'm so glad we saw this right before we left. It's a little measuring chart so you can see how much your child grows in a year. She is covering up the 2 and she's about 2 1/2 feet tall. 30 inches!!!! Can't wait to see how tall she is next year.

Just a randomly cute pic I took one afternoon.
After she saw all the animals we stopped for her first face in the cutout shot. Daddy zoomed in on her, but there were several animal options and the sign said I was an ANIMAL at Great Country Farms.
This was by far the most fun thing at the farm. It was industrial corrugated plastic tubes side by side so if you wanted to you could race down. It was 60 feet long, and FAST! SHE LOVED IT!!! She rode with Daddy several times and Mommy once.

Posing with the P-Rex. It's a huge fake dino that they use to crush pumpkins. We had to leave before that show, but we still got a pic with him.

Baby in a tire! They had these down by the pig racing area, yes we watched pigs race and it was pretty funny. They get them to run by giving OREOS for treats. Anyway, we thought she should try out her best Goodyear baby pose. :)